What is Staff Council?

Purpose

  1. To serve as a representative advisory council.
  2. To provide a vehicle for communication of interests, concerns, and issues that affect staff.
  3. To present recommendations to University leadership.
  4. To provide nominations to university committees and task forces.

More information can be found on the of the council can be found on the Staff Council wiki .

Our values

Our values were decided by the members of the 2017-2018 Staff Council and are more than just words on a page. They're the way we do business. They're how we build and maintain trust with our stakeholders. They're how we decide what's important for us to work on. They're the way we ACT.

Advocacy

Collaboration

Transparency

Accomplishments

A public list of highlights can be found on the Accomplishments page of the Staff Council website. A more detailed list can be found on the Staff Council wiki accomplishments page.

UTSC accomplishments for the year are shared with the university's president via written reports at the end of the Staff Council term (May), as well as at the UTSC May meeting, which the president and other university administrators typically attend.


Benefits of being a Representative

Responsibilities

Communication

Expectations

As a Staff Council Representative you communicate to various groups, including your supervisor, your constituents, your fellow committee members, and other Representatives. You may also need to communicate with various stakeholders or people within the university who can help you make progress on a specific UTSC-related task. Always use professional language when communicating as an official Staff Council Representative. 

When communicating with your constituents, best practices are:

Executive Committee

The Executive Committee is made up of all Standing Committee chairs, the four UTSC elected officers, the UT System Employee Advisory Council Representatives for UT Austin  (ex officio), and the UTSC Program Coordinator (ex officio). A list of the current Executive Committee members and their contact information can be found on the Staff Council website by following these directions:

Elections and Appointments

Officer elections

Staff Council’s Officers are elected with the assistance of the Parliamentarian and vote counters. The nomination period begins the day of the January General Meeting and ends at 5pm (CST) the day prior to the February General Meeting. Voting opens the day of the February General Meeting and closes no more than 5 days later. Officers shall be elected in a vote that has a quorum of at least half of all UTSC Representatives participating. Voting shall occur with a ranked-choice voting system. See the UTSC Bylaws and Standard Operating Procedures for additional information.

Committee Chair Appointments for Standing Committees

Staff Council’s Committee Chairs are usually informally elected by Standing Committee members prior to the end of the current term in May.

More information on Executive Committee

Organizational Chart (OUTDATED)

This chart is an example of how committees are typically organized. The Chair oversees the whole UTSC body and each representative is either an officer or part of a committee. The Standing Committees are written into our bylaws and will always exist unless the bylaws are changed. Sometimes there are Ad Hoc committees formed as the need arises. The Elected Officers (Chair, Vice Chair, Parliamentarian, and Secretary), all of the Committee Chairs,the UT System Employee Advisory Council Representatives for UT Austin  (ex officio), and the UTSC Program Coordinator (ex officio) make up the Executive Committee.


Appendix

Staff Council Bylaws and Standard Operating Procedures (last updated March 2022) can be found on the How We Work page of the Staff Council website .